


Crazy stupid, you and me

by notinclinedtomaturity



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: Fluff, Getting Together, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-21
Updated: 2015-07-21
Packaged: 2018-04-10 10:26:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,489
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4388255
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/notinclinedtomaturity/pseuds/notinclinedtomaturity
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the middle of a fight, Dan accidentally screams out his true feelings for Phil. In a panic, he runs out the the apartment (and London) before Phil has the chance to react.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Crazy stupid, you and me

**Author's Note:**

> this just kind of popped into my head and wouldn't leave.

Dan and Phil stood at opposite ends of the lounge, arms crossed in anger, screaming at each other.  By this point, neither was quite sure what had set off the fight almost an hour ago, but it had quickly escalated into airing all of the dirty laundry between them.

“I don’t get it Dan, you’ve been acting like an insufferable twit for a while now!” Phil stopped shouting and addressed his next statement more to the ground than Dan. “You’ve been avoiding me and I don’t like it. You barely looking me in the eye anymore, we haven’t had breakfast together in weeks, and you don’t even banter with me unless it’s for a video… I don’t know what I did and it hurts.”

Everything Phil said was true.  Dan _had_ been avoiding Phil for several weeks now and _of course_ he know it was probably hurting Phil.  But lately he’d been having an above-average difficult time keeping his feelings in check and the only way he knew how to handle them was to withdraw from Phil.  But looking at his best friend standing in front of him, something inside of Dan snapped.

Dan didn’t lower his voice. “You know what, Phil? Yeah. Yeah, I have been avoiding you. I got sick of all the lying and the bullshit and the hiding. I love you, Phil. And not in the you’re-my-best-friend way, either. I _love love_ you and it fucking sucks. Because it turns out hiding it since literally 2009 has been hard as hell and I can’t do it anymore.”

Phil stared at Dan with wide eyes, slowly sinking down into the couch.  Before he could recover and say anything, Dan realized the full gravity of everything he had just said.

_Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck._  Dan turned and ran out of the lounge, relieved that he was already by the door and didn’t have to pass Phil to exit.  Without a second thought, he sprinted down the stairs, grabbed his wallet and jacket from by the front door and ran out of the apartment. As he pulled the door shut behind him, he heard Phil coming down the stairs and calling out his name, but Dan really couldn’t handle facing Phil right now. Not yet anyway.

He zig-zagged down the streets until he was confident that his directionally-challenged friend wouldn’t be able to find him. Leaning over, he rested his hands on his knees and he tried to catch his breath. _Jesus, I really need to get fit, this is ridiculous._

Out of the corner of his eye, Dan spotted a passing taxi and  quickly hailed it. 

“Where to, sir?” the driver asked as Dan plopped into the back of the car.

“Uh…” Dan froze. All he knew was that he needed out of the city.

_I could get the train to Wokingham, go home for a bit…_

_No too obvious, that’s probably the first place Phil would look._

He reached inside his coat pocket and was grateful to find that his passport was still there from his trip to Berlin last week.

“London Heathrow, please.”

\-------------------

Phil stood on their front steps, glancing back and forth down the street, looking for any signs of Dan.  When he didn’t see any, he dejectedly turned and went back inside their apartment.

Grabbing his phone of the table, he clicked on Dan’s name, praying he would pick up. It wasn’t until the third ring, however, that he noticed the slight buzzing noise coming from the couch. Reaching between the cushions, he found Dan’s phone and ended his call.

_Darn,_ Phil thought. _I guess I’ll just have to wait for him to come home._

He walked back out of the lounge and sat on the stairs, just inside the front door, and waited.

\-------------------

At the airport, Dan approached the nearest ticket counter.

“How can I help you?”

“I need on the next possible flight to LA.” _Well, there go the frequent flyer miles I was saving for our next trip to Japan._

The woman at the ticket counter gave him a questioning look.  Glancing down at himself, he figured he probably did look like trash.  He was wearing his gray sweatpants, a wrinkled t-shirt, and his nice leather jacket. _Great fashion choice, Dan!_

“Okay, one moment… the next flight begins boarding in about 40 minutes. If you hurry, you should be able to make it in time. But you don’t have time to check a bag.”

“Uh... that’s fine, I don’t really have a bag anyway.”

Once again the woman looked at him oddly and he desperate wanted to say something snarky to wipe the look off her face (and maybe improve his mood a touch), but he didn’t have the energy to think of anything to say.

The woman reached over to hand him his ticket and he practically ripped it out of her hand as he began sprinting for the second time, this time toward security.

As he regained his breath at the gate, he noticed he had ten minutes to spare before boarding began.  Out of the corner of his eye, he caught a small group of girls at the next gate over eyeing him and trying to take subtle creeper pictures of him.

_Great, now is literally the_ worst _time to run into fans. I look like absolute trash and I just want to get out of the country unnoticed. Is that really too much to ask for?!_

Looking around him, he saw a tourist shop and had a stroke of genius.

In the shop, he went directly for the clothing section, hunting for a jacket with a hood he could pull up to cover most of his face. He was disgruntled to find that all the jackets advertised London in some way.

_Well,_ he thought, _if I’m going to have to wear a tourist jacket from the place I_ live _, it might as well be the most ironic one possible._

He grabbed the black hoodie with “I HEART LONDON” written on the back in neon green letters and quickly paid for it before yanking it over his head (and leather jacket) and pulling the hood as far up as possible.

\-------------------

Cat was sitting in her living room, filming her newest vlog, when she heard a rough knock at the door. 

_Weird,_ she thought as she walked to the door, _my Amazon package isn’t due for delivery until tomorrow._

However, when she opened the door, she was surprised to see that it wasn’t the UPS man on her doorstep.

“DAN! What are you doing here?”

He still had his hood pulled up and was nervously looking around the street for people who could potentially recognize him.

“Surprise…” he said weakly. “Uh, can I come in?”

Cat quickly stepped to the side and opened the door all the way so he had room to step inside.

They stood in the entrance, quiet for an awkward moment before Cat finally spoke.

“I didn’t know you and Phil were in town!”

“We’re not,” Dan said with a pointed look.

“Oh…” Realization dawned in Cat’s eyes. “Is, uh, everything okay?”

“Yeah, yeah it’s fine. I just…” Dan trailed off, unable to think of a good explanation for showing up on his friend’s doorstep, in another country, with no notice. And without his other half.

Cat inspected him for a moment..

“Well, why don’t you sit in the living room? I can get us some coffee? And then we can talk. Or not talk. Whatever you want.”

Dan nodded silently and walked into the familiar room in a daze.  Desperate to do something with his hands, he reached out and began straightening all of the knick-knacks and magazines in the living room.

Cat returned with two mugs of coffee and passed Dan his. They drank their coffee in silence as she waited patiently for Dan to start talking.  But nearly ten minutes later, when he still hadn’t said anything, she finally decided to break the ice.

“So, do you want to ta—”

“No.” Cat was taken aback; Dan’s voice was terse and harsh.

“Okay, well I was in the middle of filming my vlog, but do you want to go out? We can get some dinner?” She eyed the ‘I HEART LONDON’ hoodie skeptically. “I know this little tiny place where almost no one ever goes. You won’t get recognized so you can take off that horrible jacket.”

At the mention of food, Dan’s eyes lit up for the first time since he’d left his apartment. Cat chuckled and pulled Dan off the couch. He dropped the hideous hoodie on the armchair and followed Cat out the door.

\-------------------

Cat wasn’t kidding when she said the restaurant was small; there were only five small tables and they were all completely deserted. In the back, there was a large brick oven that the heat radiated off of.

Dan dropped his jacket on the chair next to him and immediately felt cooler.

“How do you even know about this place?” Dan asked in slight awe as he looked around. The restaurant was dimly lit, but it was a grungy kind of light, not a romantic kind of light, which made Dan feel much more at ease. It wasn’t the ideal moment to be reminded of things like happiness and romance.

“I know it doesn’t look like much, but I swear they have the best pizza here.  Actually do you mind if I vlog this quickly? I have been meaning to talk about this place in a video for ages.”

Dan shrugged. “Yeah, sure. Could you just not get me in it?”

Cat pouted a bit, sad that her friend seemed to be so down that he didn’t even want to film a silly video, but nodded understandingly.

 

After dinner, they went back to Cat’s and watched a little AHS (at Dan’s pleading) while Cat finished her vlog before bed.

\-------------------

Phil woke up with a massive pain in his neck from his awkward sleeping position on the stairs against the wall. Glancing at his phone, he realized that it was nearly two in the morning and Dan still, presumably, wasn’t home.

He trudged upstairs to his bedroom, double-checking in Dan’s room to make sure he hadn’t snuck in while Phil was sleeping. He sighed at the empty bed and gently closed Dan’s laptop before lying down in his own bed, fully clothed and facing the open door.

_If Dan isn’t home by morning, I’ll start asking around_ , he thought as he drifted back to sleep.

\-------------------

When Phil woke up in the morning, he immediately searched the apartment for signs of Dan. He was disappointed to see that everything was exactly the way it was the night before: Dan’s laptop was still shut on the middle of his bed, the bowl was still shattered in the kitchen from where Phil had accidentally dropped in during their fight, and the front door was still locked and dead bolted.

With a sigh, Phil grabbed his phone and decided to start phoning their friends to make sure Dan was all right.

He called Louise first, knowing that she always can cheer Dan up.

_“What do you mean Dan didn’t come home last night, Phil!?”_ Louise practically shouted.

“I’ll take it he isn’t with you then?” Phil asked.

Louise sighed. “No, he’s not. What happened?”

“Well, we got in a bit of a fight and he left and then he didn’t come home and his phone is still here and I just really want to make sure he’s okay.” Phil lightly kicked the Pikachu plushie at his feet. “And talk to him about it, too, I guess…”

“I’m sorry Phil, that’s awful. I haven’t seen him, but I’ll text you if he shows up or calls or anything, okay? And chin up, I’m sure he’ll be home in a few hours and you two can make up like lovebirds,” Louise said, only partially joking.

A deep blush rose to Phil’s cheeks. _If only she knew…_ he thought.

After Louise, he phoned Dan’s brother, checking to see if he had gone home, but he wasn’t there either. He slowly worked his way through his phone book and even looked through Dan’s contacts to see if there were any of his friends he had missed.

His head dropped onto the back of the couch in defeat, disappointed and a bit worried that none of their London friends, nor Dan’s family, had seen him in the last 24 hours. Suddenly, he had a bright idea.

He opened Twitter on his phone and quickly typed a tweet.

@AmazingPhil: I seem to have lost @danisnotonfire and he doesn’t have his phone. Has anyone seen him in the last 24 hours? Let me know :) #FindDan

After publishing the tweet, he realized how worrisome it might appear (though, tbqfh he was worried, but he didn’t want their fans to know that).

He immediately published a follow-up tweet.

@AmazingPhil: Don’t worry guys, not urgent! @danisnotonfire is fine. I just lost him because I’m a giant klutz. Help me #FindDan please?

\-------------------

Cat’s phone dinged. Unlocking it, she saw she had two twitter notifications from Phil.

“Dan?”

Dan lifted his head slightly off the couch.

“I know you don’t want to talk about whatever it is—and that’s fine—but did you not tell Phil where you were going?”

Dan felt himself blushing and buried his head into the arm of the couch. “Er, no. Why? Did he text you?”

“Not exactly.”

Dan sat up, confused. “Then how do you know he doesn’t know where I am?”

Cat threw her phone at Dan in response. When Dan read the tweets, he immediately fell back into the couch and muffled something into the pillow.

“I’m going to text him.”

“NO!” Dan answered, far too quickly and loudly.

“But he’s clearly worried about you!”

“I don’t care.”

Cat was really perplexed. Up until now, she was okay with Dan sulking and not talking about whatever happened between him and Phil, but now she was too concerned to not be pushy.

“Dan! Sit up right now.” Startled, Dan did as she said. “I didn’t want to pry, but you showed up here, unannounced and upset and apparently without telling _anyone_ where you’ve gone and I’m worried. What happened?”

Dan found himself blinking back tears. Covering his face with his hands, he mumbled something Cat didn’t quite catch.

“What was that?”

Dan moved his hands away from his face and he knew that Cat could see that he was properly crying now. “I told him, Cat.”

Her brows furrowed in confusion. “Told him what?”

“ _It_. I told him _it._ ”

Realization dawned on Cat. “Oh.”

“Yeah.”

“What did he say?”

Dan picked at a loose thread in his pants. “I don’t know.”

“What do you mean you don’t know?”

He sighed, finally looking Cat in the eyes. “I mean, I don’t know. I left before he could respond.”

“WHAT? You just ran out? And came to AMERICA of all places? Don’t you want to know what he feels?”

Dan laughed without any real humor. “Why? So I can hear whatever gentle let-down speech he’s now had a full day to prepare? No thanks.”

Cat wrapped her arms around her friend. “Everything will be okay, baby, I promise. You and Phil will be fine” And she wasn’t lying—she knew it would be because months ago Phil had sworn her to secrecy on how he felt about Dan. “You know you have to go home and deal with this at some point, right?”

Dan nodded. “Can I just hang out for a few days while I gather my courage?”

Cat chucked. “Of course, Dan. Of course.”

\-------------------

Phil scanned through all of the replies to his tweets with the hashtag #FindDan. Most were just fans expressing their concern or joking about his extreme klutziness. A couple speculated about a possible ‘domestic tift’ between them and Phil actually groaned out loud at the reality of them.

But after nearly an hour of scrolling, he found a useful tweet.

@phannatic4970: a wild @danisnotonfire was spotted yesterday at London Heathrow! #FindDan

The tweet was accompanied by a picture that Dan clearly wasn’t aware the person had taken, and sure enough, he was in his sweat pants and leather jacket from the day before.

Phil opened the picture and zoomed in, hoping to get a clue as to where Dan was headed. It was blurry, but behind Dan’s shoulder, he could make out the gate screen flashing LAX as the plane’s destination.

Without hesitating, Phil pulled on the nearest clean clothes, grabbed his wallet, and called a taxi.

\-------------------

In the taxi ride, Phil fiddled with his phone, desperate for a distraction. After tweeting a massive thanks with extra hearts at the fan who had posted the photo of Dan, he opened the YouTube app and scrolled through his subscriptions.  With a small smile, he clicked ‘play’ on Cat’s latest vlog, vowing to see visit her in LA after he found Dan.

\-------------------

Cat wandered back into the living room a bit later, only to find Dan in the same place on carpet as she had left him, but now the bag of Whoppers was nearly empty.

She sat on the armrest and nudged his thigh with her foot. “Come on, Dan. Let’s go out for a drink or something. Laying on the ground in an existential panic isn’t going to change anything and it’s only going to make you feel worse.”

Without looking up from his facedown in the floor position, Dan conceded that perhaps going out for a drink could be a good distraction. “I don’t have anything to wear,” he mumbled.

“What was that, Dan?”

Dan lifted his head up. “I said, I don’t have anything to wear.”

Cat laughed, happy to see her friend worrying about something so mundane. “Well, then I guess we’ll just have to go shopping first.”

\-------------------

That night, Cat walked back up her street with a slightly tipsy Dan, who was dressed in a brand new pair of black skinny jeans and a tight black button down. He clung tightly onto her shoulders, but by now she wasn’t sure if it was more for physical or emotional help.

As they approached her front door, she noticed the dark outline of a familiar lanky figure on her front porch.

“You go talk to him, Dan. I’m going to run to the grocery store for some food, okay?”

Dan looked confused until he saw whom Cat was talking about.

“No no no no no, Cat. You promised you wouldn’t text him!”

“She didn’t have to.”

Dan turned around slowly to face Phil. He opened his mouth to say something—anything—but was cut off before he could form words.

“Dan, are you absolutely insane? You can’t just run off for days without telling anyone where you were going! Do you have any idea how worried I’ve been about you?”

Dan kicked a small rock around with his foot, avoiding Phil’s eye. “I just thought it would make things a bit less awkward if I left for a bit.”

“You didn’t even give me a chance to say anything!”

Dan turned and began walking toward the street again. “I don’t really want to hear it, either. I’m sorry I said anything. I didn’t mean to jeopardize our friendship.”

Phil jumped up and grabbed Dan’s arm, spinning him around so his face was just inches away.

“You’re still not letting me talk and it’s not fair.”

Dan closed his eyes and sighed. “Fine. Go. Speak.”

Silence hung in the air for what felt like ages, but Dan could still feel the tight pressure of Phil’s hand on his arm. Just as he was about to open his eyes to ask Phil if he planned on saying anything, he felt something soft pressed against his lips.

Dan’s eyes sprung open in shock when he saw that it was indeed Phil’s lips that were on his mouth.

Phil pulled back, resting his forehead against Dan’s. “If you had just let me speak, you would have known. I love you, you idiot.”

Dan smiled widely as he closed the space between his and Phil’s lips, unable to kiss him properly because he was smiling so much.

“How did you know I was here?”

“Because I love you.”

Dan glared at him.

“Okay, okay. Someone in the phandom tweeted about seeing you board a plane to LA and then I saw your jacket on the chair in Cat’s vlog. _And_ she vlogged about watching AHS. It wasn’t even that hard.”

Dan smiled. "Thanks for coming to find me, Phil."

Phil pulled Dan tightly into his embrace. "Any time, bear. Any time."

They hugged in silence until Phil saw Cat approaching over Dan's shoulder. Before greeting her, he whispered softly in Dan's ear.

"By the way, bear, your arse looks  _great_ in those new jeans."

 

**Author's Note:**

> you can find me on tumblr at [imnotinclinedtomaturity](http://www.imnotinclinedtomaturity.tumblr.com) and [iminclinedtowriting](http://www.iminclinedtowriting.tumblr.com)


End file.
